The Avenue des Champs-Élysées (French pronunciation: [av(ə)ny de ʃɑ̃zelize] ( listen)) is a street in Paris, France. With its cinemas, cafés, luxury specialty shops and clipped horse-chestnut trees, the Avenue des Champs-Élysées is one of the most famous streets and one of the most expensive strips of real estate in the world. Several French monuments are also on the street, including the Arc de Triomphe and the Place de la Concorde. The name is French for Elysian Fields, the place of the blessed dead in Greek mythology. The Avenue des Champs-Élysées is known as "The most beautiful avenue in the world", La plus belle avenue du monde in French.

The avenue runs for 1.91 km (1.18 mi) through the 8th arrondissement in northwestern Paris, from the Place de la Concorde in the east, with the Obelisk of Luxor, to the Place Charles de Gaulle (formerly the Place de l'Étoile) in the west, location of the Arc de Triomphe. The Champs-Élysées forms part of the Axe historique.

One of the principal tourist destinations in Paris, the lower part of the Champs-Élysées is bordered by greenery (Carré Marigny) and by buildings such as the Théâtre Marigny and the Grand Palais (containing the Palais de la Découverte). The Élysée Palace is slightly to the north, but not on the avenue itself. Further to the west, the avenue is lined with cinemas, cafés and restaurants, and luxury specialty shops. The Champs-Élysées ends at the Arc de Triomphe, built to honour the victories of Napoleon Bonaparte.

Joseph Ira Dassin (November 5, 1938 – August 20, 1980), more commonly known as Joe Dassin, was an American singer-songwriter best known for his French songs of the 1960s and 1970s.

Joe Dassin was born in New York City to American film director Jules Dassin (1911 - 2008) and Béatrice Launer (1913–2005), a New-York-born violinist, who after graduating from a Hebrew High School in the Bronx studied with the British violinist Harold Berkely at the Juilliard School of Music. Both parents were Jewish. His father was of Russian and Polish Jewish extraction, his maternal grandfather was an Austrian Jewish immigrant, who arrived in New York with his family at age 11.

He began his childhood first in New York City and Los Angeles. However, after his father fell victim to the Hollywood blacklist in 1950, he and his family moved from place to place across Europe.

Dassin studied at the International School of Geneva and the Institut Le Rosey in Switzerland, and graduated in Grenoble. Dassin moved back to the United States where he earned a doctorate in ethnology at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Darren Everett Criss (born February 5, 1987) is an American actor, singer, songwriter, instrumentalist, and composer. He is also a founding member and co-owner of StarKid Productions, a media and musical theater production company based in Chicago, Illinois. He is best known for portraying Blaine Anderson, an openly gay high school student, on the FOX television series Glee.

Criss first garnered attention playing the lead role of Harry Potter in StarKid's musical productions of A Very Potter Musical and A Very Potter Sequel. In January 2012, he made his Broadway debut, starring as J. Pierrepont Finch in the revival of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying.

Criss was born in San Francisco, California, the youngest son of Cerina (née Bru) and Charles William Criss, a banker and a former director of the San Francisco Opera, the Philharmonia Baroque Orchestra, the Stern Grove Festival, and San Francisco Performances. Criss is Eurasian – his mother, a native of Cebu, Philippines, is of Chinese, Spanish, and Filipino descent, while his father, a native of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is of Irish descent. He has an older brother named Charles "Chuck" Criss (born April 15, 1985), a musician and member of the indie rock band Freelance Whales. Criss and his brother were raised in San Francisco, apart from 1988 to 1992, when the family relocated to Honolulu, Hawaii, and their father started the East West Bank, serving as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.